Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: SATURDAY, March 30, 1991                   TAG: 9103300172
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL                    PAGE: A-1   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: From the Los Angeles Times/ and The Washington Post
DATELINE: WASHINGTON                                LENGTH: Medium

REBELS ON OWN, U.S. SAYS/ WHITE HOUSE TURNS DOWN PLEA FROM KURDS IN IRAQ

"Our mandate was to get Iraq out of Kuwait," said deputy White House press secretary Roman Popadiuk. "We fulfilled that mandate. The issue of internal unrest in Iraq is an issue that has to be settled between the government and the people of Iraq."

Knowledgeable U.S. officials said Friday, however, that senior administration officials are still debating whether to authorize U.S. air strikes against helicopter gunships Iraq is using to strafe rebels.

"There are a lot of people inside the government who find it extremely repugnant" that Iraqi helicopters and other military forces have been able freely to attack rebellious Kurds in northern Iraq and Shiite Muslims in the south, slaying scores of innocent civilians not directly associated with the insurrection, according to a senior defense official.

The U.S. policy of withholding attacks on the Iraqi helicopters "is out there" as a topic of discussion and changing it cannot be ruled out, said the official, who spoke on condition he not be named.

As the remnants of the Iraqi army that appeared vanquished a month ago prepared to crush ethnic and sectarian insurgencies in the north and south of the country, President Bush is facing a moral and political dilemma.

Kurdish rebel leaders Massoud Barzani and Jalal Talabani appealed to Bush to use American military force to prevent the Iraqi army from employing its tanks, guns and planes against the rebels.

"You personally called upon the Iraqi people to rise up against U.S. to target suspected agents of Iraq. A8. Saddam Hussein's brutal dictatorship," the Kurds said. "They have now risen and are confronting the might of Saddam's tyranny."

Some critics of the administration have begun to equate the Iraqi insurgency with the 1956 Hungarian uprising when the U.S. encouraged the rebels but did nothing to prevent Soviet forces from destroying them.

Popadiuk scoffed at such a comparison, saying, "I think the parallels are unfair." He said Bush's comments about the Iraqi people overthrowing Saddam were intended only to emphasize to all Iraqis that the United States would never maintain normal relations with Iraq under Saddam.

While calling for Saddam's overthrow, the United States opposes the dismemberment of Iraq. The Kurds want independence or autonomy for northern Iraq, where they are the majority. Shiites, Iraq's largest religious-ethnic group, want to take power in Baghdad but might settle for an independent enclave in the south, where their population is concentrated.

If Saddam crushes the rebellion, Bush could face embarrassing political recriminations. The Kurds already enjoy the support of key congressmen, and if the rebels are defeated their cause could become an attractive target of opportunity for Bush's political opponents.